Menu

About Story Starts

The story start idea first came to me as I was browsing through some of my writings and came across some story beginnings that I never developed further. Yet, as I read them, I thought they were fun and decided to post them on a blog.

Misguided though this idea might be, I’m going to try it because:

It provides an outlet for these little orphan story snippets, and maybe even gives them a chance at a more fulfilling life.

I’ve had experiences doing “add-on” writing — both in person and online — and have found it to be a fun writing exercise, not to mention hilarious to read.

I have the kernel of an idea that add-on writing can be a sort of “writing improv” because many of the principles of improv come into play even though writing is a different medium.

I have never tried to do an add-on story using blogging software technology, so this is an experiment. I figure the process will evolve as we go along. I’m open to suggestions, though!

Here are my thoughts/guidelines for now:

Add on via Comments.

Try to keep the add-on somewhat short. (Ideally we just want to add the next little piece of the story.)

Have fun!

I’m sure I’ll add to this over time, but from my experience, these might be helpful:

Don’t try to write the whole story in one add-on. Just writing the next step is (a) much easier, and (b) tricky to do because it involves…

letting go. I have to let go of my ideas of where the story is going because once anyone else adds on, the story may be aimed in a very different direction than I thought.

One very helpful improv principle to play with is “Yes and…”Saying “Yes” to your partner(s) means you’ve listened to their offer (whatever they added to the story) and will continue the story by going with it and adding on.